Change – it feels like a season of change in the commercial radio industry at the moment and this RAJAR release may well be overshadowed by the news that Global Radio have sold eight stations to Irish telecoms giant Communicorp today.

However, that should not detract from some strong figures. 91% of the UK population now listen to radio every single week, proving that radio is on the up, and digital listening is also on the march with over 50% of the population listening digitally every week.

2. Which radio station is your RAJAR hero?

talkSPORT. With the Football World Cup fast approaching their strong performance of 3.2 million listeners will hold them in good stead with perspective advertisers wanting to be associated with an official broadcaster. Perhaps unsurprisingly the station has a strong male bias (81%) and also delivers well against the sort after ABC1 audience with 55% of their listeners falling into that socio-demographic.

It’s also good to see that in their first ever set of RAJAR results, independent local radio station to Milton Keynes, MK FM has delivered a reach of 7,000 weekly listeners.

3. Which station has surprised you this quarter?

Kisstory; after a really strong first RAJAR I wasn’t expecting to see a great deal of growth this quarter – especially as the station is currently only available via the mobile app, website and digital TV – but it’s up yet again to reach 927,000. Listeners are obviously loving the old skool tunes!

4. How would you describe digital radio’s results?

Digital radio continues its rise, demonstrated by a fantastic set of results for digital-only stations. Bauer Media, after purchasing Absolute Radio last year, can claim a 1-2-3 in terms of weekly listeners. Absolute 80s at no1 with 1.18 million, Planet Rock at no2 with 1.14 million and 927,000 for Kisstory at no3.

36.1% of all digital listening hours is via a digital platform with DAB sets finding their way into more homes with 45.9% claiming to own one. Can that figure break 50% this time next year?

5. What about the notorious London Breakfast Show battle?

Dave Berry and Lisa Snowdon will be delighted! Their Capital FM breakfast show (6 – 10am) keeps its place at number 1 whilst adding another 104,000 listeners since last year. They now reach just under 1.2 million listeners every week.

Kiss 100 FM with Rickie, Melvin and Charlie (6 – 9am) has also added listeners and keep their spot in second; 27,000 more than last year, now up to 824,000.

Neil ‘Foxy’ Fox on the Magic breakfast show (5 – 9am) climbs back into 3rd after dropping to 5th last quarter. He now reaches 714,000 weekly listeners.

Heart London with Jamie Theakston and Emma Bunton (6 – 9am) keep their fourth place despite losing listeners, reaching 610,000 and Nick Ferrari ontalk station LBC 97.3 (7 – 10am) drop to 5th but have 48,000 more weekly listeners than this time last year at 599,000.

6. What’s your favourite fact this quarter?

A good RAJAR for the Jacks!

JACK fm Swindon has had a massive increase on it’s year on year listeners. Up 357% to take it to 32,000 weekly listeners.

JACKfm Oxfordshire, which includes 106 JACKfm Oxford and Jack 2 (RAJAR’ed as Glide FM), have increased their reach by 62% year on year – going from 66,000 (Dec 2012) to 107,000 (Dec 2013).

7. To close, describe RAJAR Q4 2013 in one sentence?

Great RAJAR all round – it’s great when the stats back our conviction that radio plays a vital part of the media mix and in peoples lives.